As part of their redevelopment of “English Town” CITIARC/WQB have been retained to provide retail design criteria, signage, streetscape, and developmental guidelines for the cellar, street floors, and second floor retail spaces throughout the project.
American Medical Center of Beijing
Beijing, PRC
WQB Architecture led the development team in the site procurement, planning and design for a 250 bed Women’s and Children Hospital for a joint venture between American Medical Centers and Peking Union Hospital. The hospital was scheduled as a full service facility but primarily it was programmed to provide examinations, diagnostic and outpatient treatment facilities for over 200,000 patients per year. Planning and design were completed but the project was abandoned due to the death of a key management executive.
Interactive Development Associates assisted the Vintage Group in negotiating the purchase of the RKO Theater Site on Main Street in Flushing, NY from foreclosure at Doral Bank in December 2011. Throughout 2012‐2013, IDA assisted Vintage in restructuring project from a luxury condominium to a viable rental project by redesign and negotiating the approvals at the NYC Board of Standard and Appeals, the NYC Department of Buildings and the Federal Aviation Agency. Throughout 2013 IDA worked with Vintage to create a viable financing structure and selecting equity partners. In December 2013, IDA was instrumental in assisting in the sale of the improved property to a local development group and helping Vintage secure a 100% return on their investment.
The New York Educational Construction Fund is a municipal organization which is responsible for capital budgets related to the funding of new schools in the five boroughs of New York City. In 1996, as the NYC real estate market was recovering from the 1992 “recession,” the NYECF determined that 7 schools were in prime locations and that the development rights (TDR’s) of those schools had sufficient value to fund new schools and services in those neighborhoods, NYECF issued a national RFP for consultants to provide analysis required to evaluate the scope of development of each site, provide a valuation study for each site and assist the City of New York in marketing the TDR to the development community. After extensive interviews, IDA was awarded the contract to prepare development and marketing packages for the 7 schools. To date, 2 of the schools have been sold and are in construction – P.S. 59 and M.S. 114. M.S. 114 was developed as a 35 story condominium, the Azure, above a new school. PS 59 will be an elementary school and a new High School of Art and Design, which will be in a 50 story condominium tower on a retail base.
Cabarete, located on the Atlantic Coast of the Dominican Republic, has been known for years as one of the top 3 windsurfing spots in the world. An international development team has purchased a mile of pristine beach called The Miracle Mile for construction of 400 condominiums, a shopping village, and a 300 key full service Hyatt Regency Resort. The resort will feature 260 rooms and suites and 40 timeshare condominiums as well as a 15,000sf banquet/conference center with full corporate services, a Hyatt Signature Spa, Camp Hyatt, and a full complement of sports facilities and restaurant venues. As the only full service facility in Cabarete, the Hyatt is expected to be the home of major sporting events, corporate meetings, weddings and family vacations for years to come.
This residential project, which revitalized abandoned buildings and replaced an urban lot, created affordable one and two‐bedroom units for families and seniors in Harlem. It was developed by the Community Preservation Corporation and the Center Development Corporation, and sponsored by the Shiloh Baptist Church and St. Philips Episcopal Church. The project combined the gut renovation of an existing 100‐year old building with new construction on an adjacent lot into one new elevator serviced residential building. The other phase was the gut renovation of an existing century‐old building into a five‐story walk‐up due to ADA compliance. The project was an HPD acquisition RFP site, funded by a mixture of New Market Tax Credits and Tax Exempt Bonds, loans from the CPC with 421‐a tax abatement and j‐51 tax deferrals. Construction was completed in 2009.
LOS SURES
Brooklyn, New York
LOS SURES is a community based not-for-profit housing development corporation in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. It was founded in 1973 by a priest, a school teacher, a legal service attorney and 3 VISTA (Volunteers in Service to America) volunteers. One of the VISTAs, WQB founder William Brothers, became architect for the new company. Working with Bernard Rothzeid at RKTB, Mr. Brothers developed strategies for moderate renovation of “en-rem” NYC HPD buildings and the conversion of those buildings to tenant owned cooperatives. LOS SURES was also active in converting demolition sites into parks, lunch programs, tenant education, and was successful in conversion of one NYC’s most dangerous, drug-infested neighborhoods into a safe moderate income family community.
Manhattan West
New York, New York
Manhattan West (in red above) is a 17-story affordable rental building between 10th and 11th Ave. and 55th and 56th St. The building was designed in response to an RFP issued by the City of New York. The project strategy was to design a larger building than the RFP requested and to spend the extra rental income on better building materials and finishes than competing teams offered. This bold strategy required WQB and their collaborator, the firm of Rothzeid Kaiserman Thomson & Bee, to prove that their design would fit the scale of its surroundings. The solution was an “I” shaped design, with a six-story street wall continuous with the Potemkin building (in light-blue above), and a mid-section that spans the block and matches the height of some neighboring 17-story apartment towers. The Kretchmer Companies, ELH MGMT, and the Dermot Company were the developers. The design was submitted in 2007 and has yet to be awarded.
359 East 157th St.
Bronx, New York
Manhattan Boutique Real Estate (MBRE) and SOBRO are submitting a development proposal to the NYC Housing Preservation Development Commission for development of 359 East 157th Street in the Bronx as a community residence for homeless and low income senior citizens. The building is designed to be environmentally friendly, promote an active life style and includes an intergenerational center to provide services for the seniors and help them integrate into the surrounding community.
